Houvenaghel speaks of British Cycling ‘oppression’

FORMER world champion Wendy Houvenaghel has said the pursuit of “medals at any cost” was behind the creation of a “culture of fear” within British Cycling’s World Class programme.

Houvenaghel accused the organisation of ageism, adding that coaches had “zero regard” for her welfare and she felt “oppressed” by former performance director Sir Dave Brailsford and former technical director Shane Sutton.

The Olympic medallist said she was “pleasantly surprised” a leaked draft report into the culture and climate within British Cycling had vindicated the criticisms put forward by the likes of Jess Varnish, Nicole Cooke and Emma Pooley.

Asked if rider welfare was as important as the drive for medals within the programme, Houvenaghel said: “No, not from my own experience. It was medals at any cost, of course. That’s how it was whenever I was there, certainly in 2012.”

Such a criticism could lead to further questions for UK Sport, which has made Olympic medal success the sole criteria for distribution of funding to sports bodies.

However, Houvenaghel also said some riders within the programme received favourable treatment and might not even have been aware of what was going on around them.

“Certain riders that were chosen and favoured will not have experienced that culture of fear in the same way so they don’t really understand,” she said.

“It’s probably quite baffling for them to hear the accounts of people in the same team, they might not have been aware of the sort of oppression going on.”

Houvenagel won Olympic silver in 2008, and gold at the 2008, 2009 and 2011 world championships but was “frozen out” of the team in the build-up to London 2012 — something she blamed on her age as she was 37 at the time.